MUSIC OF PRIMITIVE TEOPLES— PASTOE. 689 



"Long before Gorm the Old" — as archeologists we know that long 

 before .the days of the Gotones and Gotae — these strange giant horns 

 were cast. They are recognizable already'' in the northern Bronze 

 Age — more exactly in the second period (according to Montehus) ; that 

 is, in the fourteenth or fifteenth century B. C. They are found in 

 southern Sweden and Norway, Denmark, vSchleswig-Holstein, Mecli- 

 lenburg, and Hanover — lands therefore, of the North-German-Scanch- 

 navian culture circle, toward which Germanic primitive history 

 gravitates. With these luren the liistory of our famihar European 

 music begins. 



It is truly with beautiful and inspiring sounds that it thus begins. 

 The luren can still be played upon to-day. Their sound is soft and 

 full, having somewhat the character of our old trombones. The 

 deep, funnel-shaped mouthpiece also corresponds to that of our 

 trombones, while the system of its tube, wliich is conical throughout 

 its length, corresponds to that of the modern French horn. Twelve 

 tones, in three and a half octaves, can be drawn from the instrument 

 with ease, and a clever performer can increase the number to 22. 

 It has been attempted to make exact casts of the luren, but tliis has 

 not succeeded. The inner surface of the w^alls, which are only 1 to 

 1.5 mm. thick, we are unable to make as smooth as in the original 

 instruments, and it is exactly this smoothness which is required for 

 the perfect purity of the tone. 



But we are not the only ones to whom this technology is unknown. 

 Even in the time of the luren people it was not imderstood outside 

 of the North-German-Scandinavian cidture circle. We have no such 

 perfect musical iustruments from any other region, hence we can say 

 that a single tone from the tube of the luren, in its radiant purity, 

 dissolves into notJiingness all those fantastic pictiu'es wJiich represent 

 to us the German Northland as having been the home of a half-wild, 

 barbaric people who, in their culture, did not admit of any compari- 

 son with those of the South and East. 



In 1892 some luren were brought into use at a meethig of the 

 Antiquarian Society of Copenhagen by a number of concert players. 

 A report on this noteworthy session may be found in the Zeitschrift 

 fiir Ethnologic for 1892. The admiration was greatest when the 

 musicians without difficulty played some folk songs and marches. 

 This was possible on account of the large intervals of the luren, which 

 are in the natural key. With such instruments at hand a return 

 would not be made to the monotony of a rigid horizontal music. 

 Thus the luren furnisii us clear proof that already more than 3,000 

 years ago Europe possessed its characteristic music, and that on this 

 music is based our present musical perception, which is so sharply 

 differentiated froui that of primitive peoples. 



